Merry Christmas
Thank you for your patronage in 2009 and
we look forward to inspiring you in 2010!

We hope that you have a blessed Christmas with family and friends.

"She will give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins." "The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel-which means, God with us."
Matthew 1:21 & 23

May you experience the Christ child this Christmas season.

~Cori & Myra

Quilts for all!
Well I hope you are all enjoying the Christmas break, it officially started here today! It is also the first day on winter today and here in Manitoba it is a beautiful winter day. I am ready for Christmas and looking forward to the kids having lots to do (no more bored em aloud after Christmas!!)

I just wanted to share this picture of our dog max. Even country dogs need quilts! This was one of my first projects. It has been an outside "blanket" for awhile already. It was coming apart at the seams (poor workmanship I guess !) So when the weather turned cold I gave it to max. He loves it - a little too much, now there is a big hole in the center of it. BUT, I often find him carrying it around the yard or he will be lying on it on the porch. He is so cute...when he is listening!

enjoy the winter day,

~c

Happy Holidays

As you know I have been doing some Christmas baking and well I came across this recipe and thought...let's give it a try. Biscotti, something I have never made, only had on maybe one other occasion, so I gave it a try and voila!! They turned out, I gave a few to a friend with their Christmas card and she just called to tell me she was REALLY enjoying them.

So I thought, I can't have a mocha and biscotti with all of you...well... maybe I can. Make yourself a coffee, mocha, cappuccino, hot chocolate or tea and make yourself a batch of Starbucks almond Biscotti...mmm good.

http://www.grouprecipes.com/sr/24389/starbucks-almond-biscotti/recipe/

2 1/4 cup all purpose flour
1/2 cup veg. oil
1 tsp baking powder
1 1/3 cup blanched slivered almonds, toasted
1 cup sugar
1/2 tsp salt
2 extra large eggs
2 tsp almond extract or vanilla extract

the above link has all the directions on how to make your biscotti.

enjoy!
~c

Christmas baking

Well it seems that last week got away on me, completely! I promised to put up a couple of recipes for you to enjoy and I am sorry that I am so late with it. It seems that between volunteering at the Canadian Prospects hockey game in Winkler, a few hockey practices of our own, ( not "my own" but my son's) finishing up the last of the Xmas shopping, working with Myra on some really cool stuff for the new year and a cold snap to boot, the week came and went before I knew it.

This is the last week of school before Christmas break, so I have to make the most of it. We have 3 days of school Christmas concerts to go to this week as well. The weekend will be full of friends and family gatherings and then the kids are home for holidays.

This year I made a new recipe. Well actually it is an old recipe, but one of my Mother in Law's Christmas baking traditions and my husbands favorite. Several years ago, my mother in law and her sister made us girls (daughter and daughters in laws) a cookbook of old family favorites. This year I strolled the pages to find some recipe's that I wanted to add to my list of Christmas baking.

Marshmallow Roll

4 squares of semi sweet chocolate
1 cup icing sugar
1 tsp vanilla
1 cup glazed cherries, chopped
2 Tbsp butter
1 egg, beaten
mini marshmallows
1 cup pecan's, chopped

Melt chocolate and butter in a double boiler (I used the microwave). Mix all ingredients in order given. Make a roll shape on wax paper. Then roll the chocolate roll in sweetened, flaked coconut. Keep cool in fridge. Cut into slices. Freezes well. (that's if it makes it to the freezer!!)


Here is another easy treat.

Nuts & Bolts

3 cups pretzels
3 cups Shreddies
3 cups Cheerios
2 cups peanuts, cocktail style
1/2 cup margarine, melted
1/2 tsp celery salt
1/2 tsp garlic salt
1/2 tsp Worcestershire sauce

Put seasoning into melted margarine. Pour over dry ingredients. Put onto a cookie sheet and bake @250 degrees Fahrenheit for 15 min. Stir and bake for another 10 min. Cool and stir. Store in a covered container. (also freezes well.) This makes a great gift for neighbors and teachers!!



Back to sewing & quilting! By now you know that I could do every one of our quilt patterns 10 times over in different colors and fabrics. Well that is what I have been doing with a very simple pattern of ours - Chunky log Cabin. Myra had made the original sample for the pattern, so I thought I should give it a whirl myself. I have made a few log cabins but this one is bigger and goes together like a breeze!!

This fall on a trip to Ignace Ontario (shout out to our friends there!!) We made a stop in Dryden Ontario at a great fabric shop called A.J's fabrics. This shop isn't very big, BUT it has A LOT of fabric and when I say it's piled high...all the way to the ceiling!! I fell in love with this fabric collection Al Fresco by Michele D'Amore for Marcus fabrics. Myra suggested I make the chunky log cabin quilt and that is what I did the other day. I would love it to be quilted with a LARGE floral pattern (wink, wink K.G) If you haven't made this quilt yet, and need a fast and easy project for the new year, give this one a try.

Well I have rambled on long enough. I am staying inside all day today (-45 degrees with the windchill! Why do I live in southern MB?) so maybe I can get these quilt blocks sewn together!

Have a great day!
ttys,
~c

Here at last!

Here it is, the invitation! And Mrs. P was right, we will be whipping it up!
We have been invited to the "Creative Circle of excellence - A Celebration of Quilt Designers" by none other Than American Patchwork & Quilting! It is defiantly an honour.
The egg reads " We're whipping up tons of fun with a batch of the BEST quilt designers!

Does this other project look familiar? It was a free pattern in our last newsletter, tiny timber. I re-made it using scraps of Figgy Pudding by Moda. And yes, I machine quilted it my self, even a little free motion. Now, don't even thinking of enlarging the photo to check the quality lol. I have a lot of improving to do in the machine quilting department. That is why we have some amazing machine quilters on staff :)
For those of you who missed the free project - it will be on our blog as a free-bee in the new year. I better get back to the sewing machine...mmmm wonder what I am up to?! I also did some Christmas baking today, maybe I will share some recipes with you this week (haven't done that in a while hey? The baking or the sharing of it !!)

~c

Surprises
So Myra mentioned that we had received an exciting phone call this week. Well this is what arrived in the mail for us yesterday! And yes, it is related to the phone call and no, it's not an invitation to a cooking party either!! I will show you what was in side later on.

The other surprise we got this week was SNOW and lot's of it. So it looks like it will be a white Christmas after all. It is very strange for Southern Manitoba not to have had snow by November.

The third surprise is I forgot to blog about our latest photo shoot. This quilt has been finished for quite sometime now but we have been in talks as to what to do about it. It looks like the pattern will be released this spring. Astoria is unique and definitely different, therefore makes pattern writing and photography a challenge. This picture is taken in a small town called Rosenfeld (were my husband grew up) at their Lutheran Church. The other cool thing about this quilt is if you just do the center area, it is the perfect size for a baby quilt...neat hey?

I hope you have a great weekend, and remember to come back soon to see what's inside those envelopes!

~c

So we got a phone call...

Where have we been hiding? Deep under piles of fresh snow, stitching up the most amazing projects! I am waiting to share all of them with you...but a few people on my gift list tend to read this blog..so you will have to wait until after Christmas to see the most spectacular gifts. Trust me, it's worth the wait.

If you could see what Cori and I are cooking up for you in the new year, you would be wishing it was New Years Eve...but that too will have to wait.

We did have one REALLY hard job this week. We had to finalize our spring calendar, which ment we had to pick between two events that conflicted with each other. Would we go to New York, or Minneapolis? And then the phone rang, and a third option got thrown into the mix. The phone call informed us that we were receiving an invitation in the mail for a very special event. Now what do we do??!! We struggled back and forth, and in the end, we decided that we would be crazy not to accept the invitation that was being sent to us. As soon as it arrives, you will see it posted here.

Until then, stay warm and cozy under a quilt.

See you again soon.
myra

Coming Soon
Soon we will be adding our new country lane sampler pattern to our shop! This project was designed for a past retreat. We designed 2 projects and this is the one I designed. It actually tells a bit of a story. The leaf signifies my favorite season (the season I got married!), the spool is for my hobby and job, the friendship stars for my friends & family and the shoe fly block, was my first quilt block I ever made. You can change the blocks to your favorites and customize this quilt.

Now is the time to pick up a new pattern for the new year or better yet a Christmas gift!

So what have we been up to...mmm...we have been finishing projects, designing new projects and products for the new year. What have you been up to? We have been making Christmas gifts and projects. Are any of you making a bmd project to give at Christmas? I hope so and we would love to hear about it!

We had some snow today, not very much but up till now we have had some really good weather (for Manitoba that is) I really have not been in the mood to decorate for Christmas, although my Christmas shopping is just about done! horray!! And as you know, if you have younger children, that their activities keep us going.

As the year comes to an end, it is always a busy time for us. Evaluations of things that went well and things that didn't. We would love to hear what you think we have done well. Maybe your input will help us make decisions for the up and coming year!

~c

Field Trip close to home.

Do you ever visit museums in your area? Isn't is surprising that we will travel long distances to visit other interesting places, but we rarely look around at what is in our own backyard.

This summer, my son kept begging me to make the 7 mile drive, to take him to visit the dinosaur museum in Morden. For all of you who visit our great quilt show every spring, do you realize that you are standing on top of a basement full of dinosaur skeletons? This is actually the largest dino display east of Alberta, and all of the fossils are found in our area. In Alberta, all of their fossils are of land dinosaurs. In our area, all of the one's that are found are from water dinosaurs. Right now the display is housed in the basement of the Morden Rec. Center, but they do hope in the future that they will be able to build a new museum, so the dino's will be able to be brought above ground.

So I used the picture from our field trip, to introduce you to our latest project, that is on newsstands now. In the Winter 2009 issue of Quilts and More, you will find this simple and sweet project. The staff at the magazine affectionately gave it the name 'Dino might' and I can't say that name without thinking of an old TV character named Jimmy Walker. Wasn't that his favorite expression? And does anyone remember what show he was on?







Anyway, I hope that you will enjoy this latest project, and take time to discover what is in your neighbourhood.

See you soon.
myra

FREE pattern

As promised a free pattern for you to enjoy, this is one of my favorite quilts because of the fabrics. For the small squares I fussy cut out of a big floral print, it still gives it a circular feeling. Enjoy!

You can download the pattern here.

Finished Quilt Size: 38" x 50"

Sashing: 2"

1st border: 2"

2nd border: 3"

Yardages

1 1/2 yds of Fabric A for background, 2nd border & border to blocks

3/4 yd of Fabric B for sashing & 1st border

1/2 yd each of Fabric C,D,E & F for blocks

1/2 yd of Fabric B for Binding

2 yds of Fabric G for Backing

42" x 54" of Batting

Cutting instructions

From Fabric C cut:

2-4 1/2" x 10 1/2" rectangles

1-4 1/2" x 4 1/2" square.

From Fabric D cut;

3-4 1/2" x 10 1/2" rectangles

From Fabric E cut;

5-2 1/2" x 42 1/2" strips

2-2 1/2" x 34 1/2" strips

From Fabric F cut;

10-6 1/2" x 6 1/2" squares

From Fabric A cut:

16-1 1/2" x 10 1/2" strips

16-1 1/2" x 7 1/2" strips

4-1 1/2" x 4 1/2" strips

4-1 1/2" x 7 1/2" strips

2-3" x 46 1/2" strips

2- 3" x 38 1/2" strips

From Fabric B cut;

3-4 1/2" x 10 1/2" rectangles

1-4 1/2" x 4 1/2" square

Block Assembly

Begin by framing each one of the 4 1/2" x 10 1/2" rectangles and 4 1/2" x 4 1/2" squares of fabrics B, C & D.

Using the 1 1/2" x 7 1/2" as well as the 1 1/2" x 10 1/2" strips to frame each rectangle.

The plain 6 1/2" x 6 1/2" squares were fussy cut out of a large floral print, to give the illusion of circles.

Quilt Assembly

The quilt is assembled in 4 horizontal rows.

1st row; 6 1/2 square, oblong block, 6 1/2" square, oblong block, sashing strip

2nd row; oblong block, 6 1/2" square, oblong block, 6 1/2" square, square block, sashing strip

3rd row; 6 1/2" square, oblong block, 6 1/2" square, oblong block, 6 1/2" square, sashing strip

4th row; oblong block, 6 1/2" square, oblong block, 6 1/2" square, square block

Continue by adding the first border sides, followed by top and bottom. Repeat for the outer border.

~c

Sharing
Take a look at this quilt! One of our very dear "retreater's", Laurel. She shared this photo with me yesterday and I was so excitted I just had to share it with the rest of you. She just finished this quilt for her grand daughters 2nd birthday. Isn't is gorgeous! You want to know something else that is amazing about this quilt? I thought you would...it is HAND quilted! Can you believe it. I don't know if you can enlarge the picture but I just love the vine motif in the green section. And, I think she used Ric rack for the antenna!! How cool is this quilt, lucky little lady! If this inspires you check out the Little Lady pattern in our shop.

Thanks so much Laurel for sharing, if anyone else has something to share email me.

Stay tuned to our blog and website, changes coming...again and I have a free pattern to post this week!

~c

Idea!
I hate to admit it, but I don't have a lot of quilts displayed in my house. Considering I am part owner of a collection that exceeds 100 quilts! I have a few quilts on my kids' beds and a few little things here and there but,what to do with larger quilts when I don't want to hang them on the wall or have them all over the place. Myra gave me this idea one day, out of necessity. We were packing up from a quilt show, she rolled the quilts and stuck them in a bucket (they would take up less room that way). So off to the store I went and bought this basket and rolled my quilts and change them up every now and again. I really like the way it looks, especially by my wood stove. I just thought I would share in case any of you are looking for a new way to display your projects.

On another note...the winners of the charity contest are... Diane & Mary Grace. Ladies, could you please email me your mailing info? To the rest of you, I am so sorry we couldn't send you all fabric. I know all the charity's are worthy.

~c

Dandelion

Hi there, Karen here. I have a confession to make - I'm a procrastinator. If it wasn't for the last minute, I wouldn't get anything done! Having said that, I enjoy working under pressure. Well, serious time constraints came with this quilt top! Cori may wish to tell that story another day but for the moment I'll share the inspiration for the stitching design I used for this project.

The dandelion appliqué called for echo quilting of some sort. Rather than stitch a quarter inch outside the entire shape, I copied the applique and offset it the fourth inch. This created a shadow effect. This technique is effectively used with rubber stamps.

For the remainder of the quilt, I chose a cute branch motif and flower doodle from the design elements printed in the fabric then exaggerated them to fill spaces with vertical rows of stitching.

Next time you are looking for a machine quilting design for your project, look closely at the shapes printed in the fabrics. Pick one, enlarge it and stitch it, freehand, all over your quilt connecting each motif with loopy lines or stippling.

Happy stitching!
Karen

You are not kidding, this was quite the deadline to meet and lucky for us we have a wonderful quilter who's always willing to do whatever it takes to get it done! Thanks Karen!! I think we may have had about 1 week to sew, hand applique, quilt and ship. And well the shipping is a whole other issue. We researched every possible way to get this quilt to Houston by quilt market, which was about 5 days time. From Canada that's a challenge. Again...lucky for us Karen also has some great friends and they took it with them to Wisconsin and shipped it UPS from there to the hotel where the Robert Kaufman staff were staying... ffeeww...it made it in the nick of time and it hung in their booth for International quilt market! I do think that this pattern will be available as a free download on their website. I will let you know when it's up. I hope you enjoyed Karen's quilting inspirations - we do.

~c

A BIG update

We had a great weekend...our 7th annual retreat!! Here is our group photo. We started the weekend with fashion Friday. Everyone was invited to wear there most fabulous shoes and handbag and this picture is the proof that we had a very fashionable group. We had lots of laughs on Friday that's for sure. We also had show and tell, what a creative group of quilters. I will have to share those photo's another time. They spent all day & evening Saturday as well as Sunday sewing up a storm. The food, friends and fellowship was absolutely wonderful. Thanks ladies for a GREAT weekend. (but I am still recovering from sleep deprivation :)

The next 2 photo's are some pictures from our recent photo shoots. Ric Rac and Central park. These are the patterns that RJR will be kitting using their stripes and dots collection. The patterns will be up in the shop shortly. My cousin was willing to borrow her bug for the photo shoot. Oh, that brings me to another point - OUR new home page on our web site! Have you seen it yet?

A few days ago I mentioned a new give a way coming soon. Well today's the day, I know so many of our customers make quilts for donation to many good organization/charities. that is why Myra and I have decided to give a way some fabric for you to make donation quilts. This is what you have to do.

- enter your name by leaving a comment on the blog
- tell us about your charity of choice
- if your charity has a web site please share that with us too.
- tell us why you would like to donate a quilt and why we should send you the free fabric.

I won't tell you how much fabric we are prepared to give a way or how many people will receive donation fabric. So get to it, leave a comment and just wait and see what happens.

~c

2 more sleeps!

That's it only 2 more sleeps until our 8th annual bmd retreat. I can hardly wait, I think we are mostly ready just have to move all of our stuff over to the hotel and set up. I really wanted to blog about some more of our new stuff but I can't spill any secrets before retreat. I know that they are all watching the blog.

In the next few weeks we will have an announcement to make for a give a way. It will be Charity based - so for those of you involved in a charity that makes quilts to donate...keep watching.

Talk to you next week...lots to tell you.

~c

coming soon
You may be wondering what we have been up to. Well here is one of the new patterns coming out this fall. We have been doing a lot of freelance pattern design and Spectacle is a pattern we have done for RJR fabrics using their new dots and strips collection.

We always have a hard time finding new places to shoot our covers. Thanks to Myra's neighbor and his scooter!

Also check out the new logo at the bottom. Thanks to Karen for teaching us how to use photo shop.

There will be more projects to come (4 more!!). Spectacle will be hanging in the RJR booth this weekend for Quilt Market in Houston. As well there will be one of our designs hanging in the Robert Kaufman booth as well. Can't wait to share that one....later.

Other updates include;
~Myra is back at home and doing well.
~our 8th annual retreat happening Oct. 16-18th CAN NOT WAIT. Getting lots of stuff ready for that too.
~working hard to get ALL the patterns done and in the shop.

~c

Kaboom!

THANKS EVERYONE!!!! I am sitting here in my hospitable bed reading your encouraging words. My husband - who I LOVE brought me my laptop, and my ipod. And Cori - who I like very much, brought me a stack of paper, pencils and magazines to read. And we had our first blue meadow meeting in a hospital room. Ironically, it is closer for Cori to visit me here, then when I am at home. So why is everyone bringing me stuff? Because I will be here for a little while, so I might as well get comfortable.

So what brought me to the great place? My appendix ruptured very suddenly yesterday. The doctors tell me that I was an exceptional case. Of course, why would I be typical? From the start of the pain, to the operating room was a very short time frame, but by the time they got me in, the rupture had happened, and the damage was extensive.

So I now have a very close relationship with an IV pole, which will be my close friend for the next 5 days.

And now it is time for a nap. But I will blog again soon...I've got time.

see you soon.
myra

Oh Boy!

You are probably wondering why the picture of the Fisher Price Doctors kit. Yeah it's been a while since I have played Dr. but today someone we all know and love is not playing Dr. but the real thing. Myra is having emergency surgery today! It would be really neat if you would all leave a little get well message, so when she gets home and back to the computer she will have a little surprise. Notice how I wrapped the Dr. stuff in a qult? I will let her tell you the details when she's back an well.

And it never fails, she always gets sick when we are busy working on deadlines - wish me luck!!

The next photo is an invitation we got in the mail this week and it's also a clue to what I have been frantically working on this week. It's all in the hands of our trusty quilter...maybe we should send her some good luck messages too :)
Unfortunately we can not join the staff at Robert Kaufman at Market next weekend :( oh well, the invitation was so nice to get!!

There will be a whole lot more NEW stuff coming over the next few days. Thanks for watching.

GET BETTER soon Myra!

~c

Surprises are the best!
I wanted to blog so badly this weekend but we were working from a secret location from Friday - Sunday! You know her as our guest blogger, she is an "employee", our friend Karen. This trip was a spur of the moment type trip but we just couldn't resist going to Ignace ON. We had a lovely 6hour drive, with visits to three fabric shops; Oma's in Grunthal, Cottage Country in Keewatin and AJ's is Dryden. Oh what fun! You really must take a trip to all those stores, they had great stuff.

So the best part of this trip was the surprise. Karen told no one that we were coming! There is a large group of ladies in Ignace that have supported us from our very first teaching trip. The plan was to work like crazy all day and evening on Saturday. Then on Sunday this group would be meeting to have a sewing day, that is were the biggest surprise came to be. We casually walked into the room "asking for directions" you should have seen the stunned look on their faces. "What are you doing here?", we stayed to chat and catch up and then we hopped back into the car and headed home.

The second and third pictures are photos from Karen's screen porch...not a bad place to work hey? What a view!! We did so much and were SO inspired I don't even know what to tell you. The things we learned and accomplished in one day was overwhelming. The last picture is of another special "surprisee". Karen's friend (and ours too) from Stonewall MB (yes she only lives 2 hours from us and we drove 6 to surprise her!) was at Karen's for the weekend. She didn't know we were coming either! We had a fabulous time of creativity, inspirations & friendship. Thanks Karen, Judy & the "Ignace sewing group" for allowing us to crash your party!!

p.s we worked on the website, so with any luck that new home page should be up and running shortly ;)



~c

Back to School


Ahhh...do you hear that....exactly, it's quiet here today. Our kids started school yesterday, grade 2 & 5. This is a snipet of our annual back to school photo. The kids were happy to go back, my daughter more so than my son, but they booth had GREAT 1st day back. So what did I do yesterday? Myra and I spent the day working. It had been a really long time since we had a day to do some errands, meetings, a photo shoot a yummy lunch and lots of talk.

We have this beautiful walk way in Winkler along 15th street. We took many photo's along the garden path. Across the street is our local park and all of a sudden a looked over at the park and there was a group of mom's watching us. I told Myra "they probably think we are crazy! "Well not two minutes later a mom walked over...it just happened to be Myra's cousin! She said she thought that had to be Myra...who else would be taking pictures of quilts? So we walked over to the park to continue our photo shoot. Next we took a photo of our pattern Crayon Box and right on cue this sweet little girl runs into the photo unknowingly of course, just playing! So we landed up chatting with some of the mom's in the group, they were very interested in our quilts, especially the baby quilts. Yes, that's right, I am not showing you ALL the pictures we took yesterday, you will have to wait on those.

In that mom's group was another young lady, whom Myra and I got re-acquainted with. Yes, she's younger than us but I knew her from our Church, so we played a short version of the Mennonite game and off we were, many connections. Then we found out what she is up to, and architect and photographer. She gave us some great photo tips and then asked to use our camera...SURE!!! The last picture is one that Tracy took. Let's just say it's a sneak peak of a new and upcoming pattern :)

Well that was our day...I hope if you have children that have gone back to school, that you too have a nice quiet day.

~c